Barrios: Senator Barrios Looks to Help Schools Prevent and Respond to Bullying

News Release

For Immediate Release
September 15, 2005
Please Contact: Michael Bloom, 617-722-1650

Senator Barrios Looks to Help Schools
Prevent and Respond to Bullying
Bullying Often Leads to More Violent Activity

Read Senator Barrios and Senator Antonioni's
Boston Globe oped "Bullying is No Game."

Boston, MA – After hearing from a group of Everett middle school students about what they said was a big problem facing their school, Senator Jarrett T. Barrios is working to prevent and respond to bullying in schools throughout Massachusetts.

Senator Barrios discusses bullying in schools with Jerry Lopez, a student at Everett High School who helped write the "Safe Schools Act."

“Bullying not only threatens the safety of students in schools, but it’s a matter of safer communities because bullies are more likely than others to commit crimes later in life,” said Senator Barrios. “We need to be working with schools to develop programs to prevent bullying which protect the victims and works with bullies to change their behavior.”

Barrios, after meeting with the Everett students in 2004, filed a “Safe Schools” bill that asks schools to develop a Safe Schools Plan to respond to bullying and developing programs to prevent instances of bullying and violence. According to experts, 85% of bullying incidents are ignored by both adults and peers – a statistic Barrios says points to the need for schools to work with parents.

Barrios is also working with Education Committee Chairman Senator Robert Antonioni and Dr. Elizabeth Englander at the Massachusetts Aggression Reduction Center at Bridgewater State College to develop a bullying prevention plan that gives schools the tools and resources they need to develop a plan to prevent and respond to bullying.

“Schools need to develop policies, and they need to develop clear protocols and consequences for children who engage in bullying,” said Dr. Englander. “That doesn’t mean that every school needs to have the same policy, but every school needs to think about policies that make sense for them and needs to construct those policies in clear, understandable, non-legalese. Policies which lay out (a) what is forbidden; (b) what was happen when a report of bullying is made; and (c) what will be the consequences for bullying behaviors, can go far in lifting morale and encouraging children to report.”

Bullying is also seen as a gateway to more serious—and often violent—criminal activity: 60% of males who were bullies in grades six through nine were, as adults, convicted of at least one crime. Earlier this year twin brothers, Daniel and Peter McGuane, 21, brutally beat another young man to death after the 4th of July fireworks in Ayer. In the days following the incident, parents and students in the community shared stories of how the brothers had spent much of their time in middle and high school bullying other students.

Barrios continued, “I’ve heard from enough parents throughout the state that I’ve become convinced that bullying is not an isolated problem in one school or town – it’s a public safety problem that our state and schools must respond to quickly.”

On Thursday September 15th Senator Barrios testified in support of the “Safe Schools” bill at a State House hearing urging legislators to take action this year to respond to bullying.

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last updated 25-Jul-2006 09:59 AM

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